Halo Chronicles: Grunt
by OOM-9
Summary: A day in the life of a tiny yellow-clad grunt.


Updated Disclaimers/Notes: The grunt behavior in this story is based on the ones in-game. Thank's to Crow T. Robot for bringing to my attention that grunt behavior varies wildly between that shown in the books and that in-game. Also, I changed the title to avoid getting the story cofused w/ another story about a Jackal (called "The Jackal"), since in the future I hope to write stories from the POV of all the other Halo enemies (Hunter, Elite, Jackal, and hey, maybe even the Flood..). Anyways, there's no story update. Just clarifying a few things.  
  
Note and Disclaimer. All alien grunts, noises, languages, names, food products, and other miscellaneous junk have been translated to english equivalents for ease of understanding. Halo is owned by Bungie and Microsoft and any other little companies I forgot about.  
  
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Good thing that food nipple's waitin' for me at the starship, cause, man! Have I worked up a big, grunty, thirst!  
  
The towering elite turned around and glared at the little grunt, as did the red clad grunt leader. Well let them glare. The mission was over, and soon they'd be back on the Cleanser and he'd be able to take off the bulky methane gear. He'd tried taking taking off the big heavy piece of equipment outside of the marked area before. It made him feel lightheaded and funny, but one of the other grunts had slapped him on the back of the head and jammed the mouthpiece back onto his face before he could reach the bright light that was in front of him. Phooey. He wanted to see what was in that light. Oh well, he'd try and find it some other time, when he was alone, to see what that light was. But not around the others. He' get whacked again. And getting whacked in the head hurt. He got whacked in the head a lot. Especially by the big mean looking guys, the 'elites'. But elite is just a human term, the grunt had never bothered to learn the proper name for the elites. Nor did he really care. All he knew was the elites were taller, got to eat first, got to eat better, didn't get whacked in the head, and made the evil humans run away.  
  
They stepped on the grav lift and floated up to the docking bay. After a long walk (the grunt quarters weren't exactly placed in a prime location), the grunts finally reached their room and food. Some of the black ops grunts were in the sparsely decorated, misty blue room, fiddling with various weapons. Not that it mattered, as the only thing most of the grunts noticed or cared about was the food processor. The black ops grunts and the officers stared at their lesser comrades, watching them gorge themselves, sleep, and bicker over battle trophies. They glanced at each other briefly, then returned to their duties, leaving the others to their simple pleasures.  
  
The littlest grunt lay on his back with a full stomach. Aahhh....now this was why he joined up for the Covenant Military. Some of his buddies signed up for adventure, others for religious reasons, and still others babbled about how they woke up to find a plasma grenade lying next to them with a note attached to it saying join or die. But as far as the littlest grunt was concerned, the whole reason to fight was for the food.  
  
Battle Stations! Dropships departing! Report to stations immediately!  
  
Grumbling, the little grunt rolled out of bed and groggily fumbled with his methane tank and mask, hurridly strapping the equipment on. He hated going out to fight, it was noisy and tiring. Oh well, at least when he got back there'd be extra food. They always gave out extra food after a fight. He grabbed his plasma pistol and waddled out toward the dropships with the rest of his comrades.  
  
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The little grunt was glad to be back on the ground. Dropship rides were bumpy and made his tummy feel uncomfortable. He thought to himself, 'why can't they just blow the planet up from space?' Somewhere a voice in the back of his simple mind said the odd shape of this planet might explain why, but the thought was lost as all that thinking was starting to give him a headache. He switched over to pondering as to why the dropships never had any sort of restraining devices on them to keep anyone from falling out during flight...  
  
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A while later the Covenant battle group was in a field. There was a river running nearby, with large rocks scattered about. On one side of the river a squad of battle weary marines were dug in, guns pointed to the other side, where the Covenant troops were hiding.  
  
Stay down! the lead grunt barked, and all the grunts crouched low to the grass, although their large methane tanks still stuck high up in the air.  
  
While the officer was talking on his communicator, all the stress became too much for one unlucky grunt.  
  
We're all gonna die! He yelled, and he leapt up into the air and started running away. The officer looked up at the fleeing grunt, looked for a second, started to say something, then changed his mind and shrugged as he went back to chatting on his communicator. Two seconds later a loud bang echoed throug the riverbed and a white tracer tore through the unluck fleeing pig-dog, and he slumped silently to the ground. In the distance a human yelled something along the lines of "Krate Sot!" or something. It was hard for the grunt to make out.  
  
This was too much for most of the others, and they all threw up their arms and started running away as fast as their little legs could take them. The smallest grunt stared as three more grunts fell over. Then he stared as the grunts ran into some of the tall elites and the bird like, shield waving 'jackals'. He stared as the mass of grunts shifted direction like a school of fish once they realized the elites had arrived and they could win. He stared as the officers and the elites barked orders to attack, and he stared as little flashes of lights bounced off the shields of the jackals, who were busy cursing in a raspy alien tounge and firing their plasma pistols. Finally he figured he'd stared enough and happily hopped towards the elite which the grunts were now congregating around. The elite growled a menacing challenge to the humans, and the grunts echoed his challenge, although their squeeling and barks didn't have the same intimidating effect. The elite waved his rifle at the direction of the enemy and the grunts charged.  
  
The first line of grunts was immediately massacred and their bodies toppled back into the streambed, some clutching at shattered methane tubes as they struggled to breathe, others simply collapsing in crumpled heaps. The LAAG triple barreled machine gun on the back of a disabled warthog jeep fired away, making the grunt masses pay for every inch of ground they gained. Several of the grunts readied plasma grenades and chucked them at the direction of the heavy gun. The marines answered with their own fragmentation and plasma grenades. Chaos ensued as a grunt ended up with a blue glowing sphere stuck on his arm.  
  
Not again! GET IT OFF ME! GET IT OFF ME! He yelled in desperation as he ran back toward his friends, arms flailing wildly in the air. Some grunts made ungraceful belly flop dives out of his path, and others tried to rush to his aid. A big blue explosion engulfed the area they were in. Some of the marines whooped and hollered as the grunts began panicking again, but their victory cries were cut short as another wave of grunts charge foward, hopping over the piled up obdies of their dead comrades. The marines prepared to fire another death bringing volley of bullets into the assaulting horde, but amid the machine gun fire and whoops and hollers of the marines, loud distinct clicks sounded from the weapons, signifying their ammo was gone. The marines used their rifle butts to bash away at the grunts in desperation, but there were simply too many of them. In a little while all the human marines lay dead and everywhere there were grunts dancing, celebrating, and looting bodies. The riverbed was littered with the corpses of likely a hundred or more of the little fellas, who had charged headlong into enemy fire, over and over, trading their lives for the marines ammunition.  
  
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If the grunt had any intelligence at all, he might have taken the sight of so much death and destruction to reflect on life and how lucky he was to be alive. But as the case is, he simply hopped up and down on the corpse of a dying marine yelling cheerfully, MY kill! MY kill!. Grunts who got kills always recieved extra helpings from the food nipples. 


End file.
